The North Face Explore Fund Awards Grant to CMC's Youth Program

Contact: Rachel Scott

Colorado Mountain Club

303.996.2746

rachelscott@cmc.org

 

Jessica B. Lange

The North Face

510.618.2734

jessica_b_lange@vfc.com

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

 

THE NORTH FACE EXPLORE FUND AWARDS GRANT TO COLORADO MOUNTAIN CLUB’S YOUTH EDUCATION PROGRAM

CMC’S Youth Education Program supports a national effort to increase outdoor participation among Front Range youth

 

GOLDEN, Colo – December 5, 2011– The North Face has awarded a $2,500 grant to the Colorado Mountain Club’s(CMC) Youth Education Program to help children and families explore the outdoors.  CMC's Youth Education Program facilitates the understanding and respect for mountain environments, fosters well-being through self-awareness, physical activity, and teambuilding, and stimulates interest in academic topics through mountiain-related recreation.  The Colorado Mountain Club was selected from hundreds of applications.  In the final grant cycle of 2011, The North Face awarded $125,000 Explore Fund grants to 51 projects helping more than 30,000 kids to connect to nature.

 

“The Colorado Mountain Club is honored to be a recipient of The North Face Explore Fund grant. We are proud partners of the national movement to inspire youth to explore the outdoors by using the power of nature to awaken a child's senses, curiosity, and desire to learn,” said Colorado Mountain Club CEO, Katie Blackett.  “At the CMC, we believe that a key piece of engaging youth and their families with nature is by combining outdoor learning with their every day lives and current school curriculum.”  

The CMC’s Youth Education Program was established in 1999. Since it’s founding, the program has introduced over 58,000 youth to Colorado's mountains. 

“We believe in the importance of bringing youth together from diverse backgrounds and providing them with opportunities to get outdoors,” said Ann Krcik, director of Outdoor Exploration at The North Face. “We support organizations that work to create these opportunities for youth because we’ve seen firsthand how these programs can ignite a passion for the outdoors and teach them the importance of protecting the places we play for generations to come.”

 

The CMC's Youth Education Program continues to provide opportunities for over 5,000 kids annually to experience the natural world through active learning adventures--essentional opportunitites to help combat childhood obesity and prevent "nature deficit disorder." To learn more about the CMC and its Youth Education Program visit www.cmc.org.  To learn more about all of the Explore Fund grantees and to keep up on their progress visit www.planetexplore.com/explorefund and www.twitter.com/coloradomtnclub.

About The Colorado Mountain Club

The Colorado Mountain Club (CMC) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to adventure, education and preservation in Colorado. Established in 1912 by mountaineering enthusiasts, CMC now has more than 7,000 members statewide who explore and protect the wild areas of Colorado. CMC offers hundreds of events and classes for all ages and abilities. Throughout its history, the club has been instrumental in landmark achievements such as the designation of Rocky Mountain National Park, Dinosaur National Monument, and the passage of the Wilderness Act. To become a member, visit www.cmc.org.

 

About The North Face Explore Fund

The North Face® Explore Fund^TM is a grant program committed to supporting non-profit, community organizations that break down the barriers preventing children and families from experiencing the outdoors. The Explore Fund, administered by The Outdoor Foundation, finds, engages and provides funding for new partners that help further the mission of inspiring the next generation of explorers and conservationists by helping them discover nature's playground.

 

About PlanetExplore

PlanetExplore is an online community founded by The North Face, powered by partner organizations that share a passion for the outdoors, and designed to help individuals and families learn about and participate in outdoor activities and events in their area. PlanetExplore is a portal to the outdoors designed to inspire and enable people of all ages to become regularly active outside, and to enjoy the benefits gained through a connection to nature. 

 

For more information, please visit our websites:

The Explore Fund www.explorefund.com

Planet Explore www.planetexplore.com

 

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Learn Basic Mountaineering from the Pikes Peak Group School Modules!

Come learn safety in mountaineering with the Pikes Peak Group on one of two tracks in Basic Mountaineering School (BMS).  The Pikes Peak Group BMS program offers both a technical track, focused on Rock Climbing, Alpine Snow Mountaineering and Ice Climbing, as well as a Wilderness Trekking track.  Classroom sessions are offered in Colorado Springs with field sessions in and near the Colorado Springs area.

The 2012 schedule includes five classes: Wilderness Fundamentals, Wilderness Navigation, Colorado Alpine Snow Mountaineering, Colorado Rock Climbing and Wilderness Backpacking.  The sixth class of the BMS series - Colorado Ice Climbing - is taken as the final module in the winter of the following year. 

Registration will be available soon and this program fills quickly!  There are no pre-requisites to the Pikes Peak Group BMS program.

For further information please contact BMS Directors Collin Powers at powerscollin@yahoo.com or Dave Anderson at danderso@uccs.edu.  

 

BMS Colorado Wilderness Fundamentals
Thursday	March 15	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Monday	March 19	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Wednesday	March 21	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Saturday	March 24	7:30AM	2:00PM	Field Session Red Rock Canyon Open Space
Sunday	March 25	7:30AM	2:00PM	Weather Makeup Date - RRCOS
BMS Colorado Wilderness Land Navigation
Tuesday	April 10	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Thursday	April 12	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Saturday	April 14	7:30AM	4:00PM	CMC Trip - Lovell Gulch, Woodland Park
Sunday	April 15	7:30AM	4:00PM	Weather Makeup Date - Lovell Gulch
BMS Colorado Alpine Snow Mountaineering
Sunday	April 22	8:30AM	2:30PM	Instructor Training Day
Tuesday	April 24	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Thursday	April 26	6:30PM	10:00PM	City Rock Field Session
Saturday	April 28	7:30AM	3:00PM	CMC Trip - Glenn Cove
Sunday	April 29	7:30AM	3:00PM	CMC Trip - Glenn Cove
Saturday	May 5	7:30AM	3:00PM	Weather Makeup Date -Glenn Cove
Sunday	May 6	7:30AM	3:00PM	Weather Makeup Date- Glenn Cove
BMS Colorado Rock Climbing
Saturday	May 12	8:30AM	2:30PM	Instructor Training Day
Wednesday	May 16	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Thursday	May 17	6:30PM	10:00PM	City Rock Field Session
Saturday	May 19	7:30AM	3:00PM	CMC Trip - Red Rock Canyon Open Space
Sunday	May 20	7:30AM	3:00PM	CMC Trip - Castlewood Canyon
Saturday	June 2	7:30AM	3:00PM	Weather Makeup Date -RRCOS
Sunday	June 3	7:30AM	3:00PM	Weather Makeup Date - Castlewood Canyon
BMS Colorado Wilderness Backpacking
Wednesdsay	June 6	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Wednesday	June 13	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Wednesday	June 20	6:30PM	9:00PM	Lecture
Wednesday	June 27	6:30PM	8:30PM	Gear Check
Saturday	June 30	7:00AM		CMC Overnight Backpacking Trip
Sunday	July 1		5:00PM	CMC Overnight Backpacking Trip

YEP and REI at Work

On November 14^th the Colorado Mountain Club’s (CMC) Youth Education program teamed up with REI to bring our mountain weather and climbing class to a group of 5^th graders from Stedman Elementary in Denver.  The Youth Education program reaches over 5,000 students each year through a variety of experiential education programs.  We have been lucky enough to work with REI Denver to use their climbing wall in an effort to reach schools who would be otherwise unable to make it all the way out to our headquarters in Golden, Colorado.  

If you like the work that we're doing or what to help, then contact us! CMC’s Youth Education Program (YEP) relies heavily on our dedicated volunteers.  For more information on volunteering with YEP contact Ryan Johns at ryanjohns@cmc.org.

Volunteer for YEP and save a puppy

Ok, I guess the puppy thing was a little overboard but did you know that we serve over 5,000 kids each year?  Not possible without your help.  Thank you.

Here is your weekly call for help.  Let me know if any of these dates work for you and I will get you on the calendar. I have highlighted the programs coming up very soon that we still need help with.

Friday November 11^th – 2 more Volunteers at the climbing wall from 8:45 – 1:15

Monday, November 14^th – 2 programs

•   1 volunteer needed for 5^th graders climbing at the REI Pinnacle wall in Denver.  10:15 – 2:30

•    2 volunteers at the wall from 3:30-5 

Tuesday November 15^th – 4 volunteers needed from 3:45-5:15

Wednesday November 16^th - 5 Volunteers needed from 3:45-5:15

Friday November 18^th – 4 Volunteers needed 3:15-5:45

Tuesday, November 22^nd – 5 wall volunteers needed from 9:45-1:15

Monday November 28^th – 2 sessions

•     5 volunteers at the wall from 8:45-1:15

•     2 wall volunteers needed from 3:45-5:45

Wednesday, November 30^th - 5 Volunteers needed from 3:45-5:15

Let me know what works for you. Shoot me an email or give me a call at 303-303-996-2762.

Ryan Johns

Youth Education Program Manager

Susan Ershler to speak at 2012 Backcountry Incident Review Conference

The CMC has snagged a dy-na-mo speaker to be the keynoter at its annual backcountry incident review conference next year.

Susan Ershler of Seattle is the 4^th American woman to climb the seven continental summits and the 12^th to climb Everest. She was an executive in the corporate world for years. She routinely charges corporations around the world tens of thousands to inspire their sales teams with tales of how she sets ridiculously difficult goals – and meets every one of them.

Now she’s agreed to share her experience and insights with backcountry trip leaders in Colorado to help them push themselves – and their trip participants - to new heights in the backcountry while managing the risks they face.

Ershler’s presentation is set for Saturday, March 10 during the 2^nd annual conference during which we dissect what went wrong on backcountry trips that went awry, and what the leaders did to bail themselves and the participants on their trips. There’s nothing theoretical here. The trips to be discussed feature accounts of real trips on which people’s lives were in danger. The goal is to hear directly from the trip leaders themselves, to look into their eyes and understand what they went through and what they learned, so that everyone can learn the lessons they learned.

It’s spine-tingling stuff. At the first conference earlier this year, we heard from the leaders of trips on which all sorts of things went haywire, including one on which a trip participant died.

Listen to the voices of some of those who attended the first conference in early 2011. “A wonderful event…inspiring and educational,” one wrote.  Wrote others, “I thought this would be a loooong day, but time went fast and al the speakers were so interesting.” “The content was uniformly great.” “I’ve been in the backcountry for 25 years and I still learned a lot.” “Making this an annual event would be much appreciated.

The conference is open to anyone who leads trips into the backcountry – or wants to learn more about doing so. It runs 9 am – 5 pm in the CMC headquarters auditorium at 710 10^th Street in Golden. Lunch will be served. Admission is $10 for active CMC trip leaders (will lead at least three trips during 2012), $20 for all other club members and for search and rescue volunteers, and $30 for non-members.

To register, visit www.cmc.org/birc.  Seating is limited; early registration is encouraged.